JUST FOR TODAY my thoughts will be on my recovery, living and enjoying life without the use of Drugs.
JUST FOR TODAY I will have faith in someone in Narcotics Anonymous who believes in me and wants to help me to recovery.
JUST FOR TODAY I will have a program. I will try to follow it to the best of my ability.
JUST FOR TODAY, through Narcotics Anonymous, I will try to get a better perspective on my life.
JUST FOR TODAY I will be unafraid. My thoughts will be on my new associations, people who are not using and who have found a new way of life. So long as I follow that way of life, I have nothing to fear.
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"If we do an honest examination of exactly what we are giving, we are better able to evaluate the results we are getting."Chapter 10 - Emotional Pain - NA Way of Life.
When we came into the program of Narcotics Anonymous, we made a decision to turn our lives over to the care of a Higher Power. This surrender relieves the burden of the past and fear of the future. The gift of today is now in proper perspective. We accept and enjoy life as it is right now. When we refuse to accept the reality of today, we are denying our faith in our Higher Power. This can only bring more suffering.
We learn that today is a gift with no guarantees. With this in mind, the insignificance of the past and future, and the importance of our actions today, become real for us. This simplifies our lives.
When we focus our thoughts on today the nightmare of drugs fades away, overshadowed by the dawn of a new reality. We find that, when we are troubled, we can trust our feelings to another recovering addict. In sharing our past with other addicts we discover we are not unique, that we share common bonds. Talking to other NA members, whether to share the trials and tribulations of our day with them or allowing them to share theirs with us, is a way our Higher Power works through us.
We have no need to fear if today we stay clean, close to our Higher Power and our NA friends. God has forgiven us for our past mistakes, and tomorrow is not yet here. Meditation and a personal inventory will help us to gain serenity and guidance throughout this day. We take a few moments out of our daily routine to thank God, as we understand God, for giving us the ability to cope with today.
“Just for today” applies to all areas of our lives, not just abstinence from drugs. Reality has to be dealt with on a daily basis. Many of us feel that God expects no more of us than to do the things that we are able to do today.
Working the program, the Twelve Steps of NA, has given us a new outlook on our lives. Today, we no longer need to make excuses for who we are. Our daily contact with a Higher Power fills the empty places inside that could never be filled before. We find fulfillment in living today. With our Higher Power guiding us we lose the desire to use. Perfection is no longer a goal today; we can achieve adequacy.
It is important to remember that any addict who can stay clean for one day is a miracle. Going to meetings, working the steps, daily meditation, and talking with people in the program are things we do to stay spiritually healthy. Responsible living is possible.
We can replace loneliness and fear with the love of the fellowship and the security of a new way of life. We never have to be alone again. In the fellowship, we have made more true friends than we ever believed possible. Self-pity and resentments are replaced by tolerance and faith. We are given the freedom, serenity, and happiness we so desperately sought.
A lot happens in one day, both negative and positive. If we do not take time to appreciate both, perhaps we will miss something that will help us grow. Our principles for living will guide us in recovery when we use them. We find it necessary to continue to do so on a daily basis.
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"If we do an honest examination of exactly what we are giving, we are better able to evaluate the results we are getting."Chapter 10 - Emotional Pain - NA Way of Life.
I absolutely love the "Just for Today" meditations and prayers. I find myself repeating it in my head during those times when I feel lost and alone. It really helps.
"We had to have something different, and we thought we had found it in drugs."
Basic Text p.13
Many of us have always felt different from other people. We know we're not unique in feeling that way; we hear many addicts share the same thing. We searched all our lives for something to make us all right, to fix that "different" place inside us, to make us whole and acceptable. Drugs seemed to fill that need.
When we were high, at least we no longer felt the emptiness or the need. There was one drawback: The drugs, which were our solution, quickly became our problem.
Once we gave up the drugs, the sense of emptiness returned. At first we felt despair because we didn't have any solution of our own to that miserable longing. But we were willing to take direction and began to work the steps. As we did, we found what we'd been looking for, that "something different" Today, we believe that our lifelong yearning was primarily for knowledge of a Higher Power; the "something different" we needed was a relationship with a loving God. The steps tell us how to begin that relationship.
Just for today: My Higher Power is the "something different" that's always been missing in my life I will use the steps to restore that missing ingredient to my spirit.
BigV, thanks for that wonderful piece of literature. The most concealed part of our disease, the spiritual void, the emptiness that something's missing inside me that cannot be filled no matter how much I try to fill it with Drugs, Shopping, Food, Sex, People pleasing etc. Perhaps that is how I became a drug addict to start with. I remember, as an early adolescent, I would sit on the kerb of the road all night, smoking and pondering what all this craziness called life is all about. I would wonder what this God is that everyone wants to impose on me, why people die, what is this crazy cycle of people taking birth, growing up, earning money, getting married, having children, growing old, dying... only for their children to repeat the same cycle... It was all so weird and unreal... I used to call upon God or whatever everyone said is out there, demand answers to all these questions...
That led me to drugs, and I thought I was at last getting that contact with whatever's out there... and I continued using, thinking that very soon I would get my answers... And I sure do today...
Little did I realize then that since I sought those answers so adamantly then, my HP had put me on this path of addiction, to know what suffering and pain is, to experience life in all ways that I wanted to, to rub shoulders with death and fear and pain constantly... I had to pay a price to learn and evolve spiritually which was my quest even as a child... But, believe me, addiction was only a small price I had to pay to get this awesome program. Living this program today removes veil after veil, everyday, between me and my HP...
What I always felt was missing inside me, that void, the emptiness, is nothing but the CONSCIOUS CONTACT WITH MY HIGHER POWER... And today, I have it. And that makes me feel evermore grateful that I am an addict, because if I had not used and had not come to NA, I wouldn't have merged myself with my HP's will for me...
-- Edited by Tahir at 13:36, 2006-09-13
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"If we do an honest examination of exactly what we are giving, we are better able to evaluate the results we are getting."Chapter 10 - Emotional Pain - NA Way of Life.
I was sent to catholic school for 5 years and never once knew what or WHO this GOD was they were talking about, how bout that.
I did'nt know what or who my Higher power was until I got into dealing with all the troubles in my life, probably around 24 years old.
I had an awesome thing happen to me then I was in a program , Long term 18 months + and I had a dream one night. I was slowly paddling down a river in a boat and the water started getting swift, I was trying to paddle to the shore but the water took me away from it. Looking ahead I saw and heard a falls, water vapor coming up from the edge like billowing smoke. I went over. and as I was falling the water vapors turned into hands that reached out to me and caught me in flight, and a voice, the voice said " I will always be there when you fall, remember that son".
And that was the begining of my relationship with God......
Thanks for sharing about that dream, BigV. I strongly believe that thru dreams, my HP reveals those hidden things that my limited mind would otherwise cannot comprehend... I have had similar amazing dreams too, on a few occasions that have been very instrumental in my moving on to the next level of recovery too, overcoming some longtime self-imposed blocks...
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"If we do an honest examination of exactly what we are giving, we are better able to evaluate the results we are getting."Chapter 10 - Emotional Pain - NA Way of Life.
"We want to look our past in the face, see it for what it really was, and release it so we can live today." Basic Text, p.28
For many of us, the past is like a bad dream. Our lives aren't the same any more, but we still have fleeting, highly charged emotional memories of a really uncomfortable past. The guilt, fear, and anger that once dominated us may spill into our new life, complicating our efforts to change and grow.
The Twelve Steps are the formula that helps us learn to put the past in its place. Through the Fourth and Fifth Steps, we become aware that our old behavior didn't work. We ask a Higher Power to relieve us of our shortcomings in the Sixth and Seventh Steps, and we begin to be relieved of the guilt and fear that plagued us for so many years. In the Eighth and Ninth Steps, by making amends, we demonstrate to others that our lives are changing. We are no longer controlled by the past. Once the past loses its control over us, we are free to find new ways to live, ways that reflect who we truly are.
Just for today: I don't have to be controlled by my past. I will live this new day as the new person I am becoming.
pg. 313
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"If we do an honest examination of exactly what we are giving, we are better able to evaluate the results we are getting."Chapter 10 - Emotional Pain - NA Way of Life.
